You and I
by ramyunyeoja
Summary: Katara is a nerd while Zuko is overwhelmingly popular. She's a wallflower while he's mysterious. His eyes were dark and smouldering while her smile is bright and rare. "It's not me and you, Katara, it's you and I." [AU]


**Disclaimer: I do not own Avatar: The Last Airbender.**

**but if i did, i'd make the movie a whooollleeeeee lot better. onward with the story! *cheers***

* * *

Katara pushed the bicycle into the garage, her long strands of hair falling by her sides.

*Darn it. I left my book back in the house.* the young seventeen year old cursed, dropping the bike suddenly and jogged back in the house. Even with her large blue eyes that seemed to allure everyone, she took no notice of her brother fidgeting with a piece of metal. She shrugged. He was always doing something weird.

Katara burst into her room, wincing at how messy it was. She pouted, knowing she had to dig through her mess of her room. She didn't want to clean. Groaning, she pulled her hair back into a tousled bun and began to lightly clean, picking up the clothes on the ground and tossed it into the laundry basket whether they were dirty or not.

Hey, better safe than sorry. She wrinkled her nose, sniffing some shirts and gagged. Oh gosh. It smelled worse than rotten eggs and expired milk blended together and trust her, she smelled that too often. "Hey Katara!"

A loud booming voice filled the silence of the house and Katara dropped the clothes she was about to throw down the basket, she sighed in relief at her release of her job.

Down the stairs, she spotted Toph, a short cheeky grinned girl who had pretty grey eyes and long black hair. Unlike Katara who rarely wore or did her hair, Toph was remarkably known for her hair always done, often in a bun.

She turned, her lips curling into a soft familiar smile before calling out. "Toph!" Said girl turned, smiling back and jogged towards her direction. "Katara," she nudged her blue eyed beauty of a friend. "What's Sokka doing?"

Oh yes. Katara rolled her eyes, walking to the kitchen where Sokka, her older brother, who always loved to tinker with objects. He turned up, eyes rolling in disinterest before clearing his throat. "Hello ladies."

Katara furrowed her eyebrows. "Rude." She scoffed lightly before putting on a slight smile. "Sokka," she spoke warmly. "What're you doing?" Katara eyed the suspicious looking machine warily.

Sokka spoke cautiously, as if he didn't trust the two girls. Which he probably didn't. "One of my creations though I'm not sure what I want to make just yet." He scratched his head, staring down at his metal clunk and wondered what to do with it.

Shaking her head, Katara grabbed Toph's hand and led her upstairs to her room and Toph chuckled. "Sokka is always so weird." Katara nodded, a faint smile on her lips. "You know how he is, always full of weirdness."

With a push of her glasses, Katara grabbed out her trigonometry homework and some pencils, knowing how Toph had it difficult being blind. She began pointing out where the problems and sometimes even gave the answers. She was a brainiac, a nerd at Bender's High, a school for privileged kids but she wasn't anything rich or popular. Just incredibly intelligent but everyone refused to see that past her thick frames and birds nest of hair. Rarely did she go without her large piece of plastic.

By the time she finished, it was a haunting eight and Toph looked up when her phone buzzed. She frowned. "Ugh mom.." She sighed, swiping on the phone to pick up the call. "Guess I gotta go now, Katara." Katara nodded, giving the other a hug while she walked out the doorway.

The two friends did this everyday, with her helping Toph do her schoolwork while Toph strived to prep Katara for trying out sports despite it not being her forte. She wasn't bad at sports per say but she wasn't exactly a star player either. Signing, she removed her spectacles and undressed into her clothes. Tomorrow would be Monday, the weekend would be ending within a few hours and she would be returning to the horrendous place known as high school.

Shivers ran down her back and she changed, an eerie feeling just barely hanging on her shoulders. She pulled down on her white sweater and she grabbed her closet door, expecting a monster to pop out when she heard a voice. "Katara! Gran gran said dinner's ready and Dad's home as well!" Sokka yelled, unashamed and soon yelping as their old yet deadly grandmother started scolding and hitting him.

She nodded, pushing back the door and moved downstairs. Somehow, the closet bothered her very badly.

* * *

The next morning later was a bad one.

It was clear from how Katara was merely sitting by herself when three girls stalked over to her desk and one girl scowled, glancing down at their chemistry assignment that was due today. Her eyebrows rose and she slammed the sheet down onto the table.

"Loser, write my name down on this."

Katara looked up from her notebook, finally staring at the girl who had grabbed her sheet unashamedly. "I beg your pardon Azula, but this is my homework not yours." Azula rolled her eyes. She was a very popular girl, a cheerleader along with her two other lackeys and was remarkably known to be a level 9000 whore.

Katara who was seen was much less did feel much less compared to Azula. Her much tanner skin compared to Azula's fair milky skin, deep pools of blue to fiery tigress ember orbs and then Azula's confidence compared to Katara's introverted self. Plus the girl was drool worthy with accentuated curves and a long lean lithe body.

Katara however didn't feel as much envy when Azula picked on her like this, bullying her for unknown reasons. Azula scowled, shoving the pencil in her face. "Are you refusing me? Someone who looks like you?" she burst into peals of laughter, sounding more haughty and cold.

"Your thick ass glasses cover half of your face, granted you make horses looking gorgeous so your spectacles do do you some good." She snickered and Katara flinched. Just why did Azula strive to be so mean and hurtful? Just as when she thought she was done, Azula wrapped her finger around one of Katara's long strands of chestnut brown hair and eyed it warily. "Your hair looks like a bird's nest, don't you know? This must be dyed, in an attempt to be pretty like me."

Barely restraining the urge to stand up and stoop to Azula's level, she merely looked down at her book and began to read again, trying to focus on the story and it's plot more than the building anger and exasperation of Azula's nearly relentless and unnecessary bullying.

Eventually the teacher entered the classroom, calling for attention and Katara hadn't even paid attention, she glanced back down at her book when she felt multiple paper balls thrown at her back.

Katara sighed, want nothing more than to have the school day end.

Toph noticed that Katara's mood was a lot darker than this morning when lunch arrived. They sat in the corner, a table far from others and relatively empty most of the time.

Thank god she was in one of the senior classes where after lunch, she would only have two more periods and then go home. Home. It was all she desired and nothing more.

Katara groaned when she remembered it was only Monday and that the weekend was unbearably too short. Pouting, she messed around with her noodles, stuffing her mouth with her chopsticks rapidly and Toph winced. "Katara, I'm glad I can't see your mess of eating but can you please calm down before you end up inhaling the whole thing?"

Katara murmured some sort of agreement before going slower, her eyes caught on a figure walking by. A little in the short side, kind of cute and fair skin with tattoos. She sighed, her crush passing by and happened to notice Katara. He smiled politely at her, unaware of the crazy butterflies he sent to her stomach.

Toph who noticed her friend's strange silenced grinned suddenly. "Oh I'm sorry, do I hear Katara's heart racing just now?" Katara scowled, hitting the shorter's arm and Toph whined. "Hey!"

She shook her head, her eyes averting from looking at Aang. He was a junior but boy was he cute. They spoke a few times but from what she knew, he was a skateboarder and a bit of a hipster. Also a vegetarian and a huge animal supporter.

She sighed at the idealistic guy pushing forward through the lunch lines, picking up and helping another student. Why was he so so so darn perfect?

He fit her ideals anyway.

Toph cooed at her nauseatingly, forcing Katara to push her away as she ate. "Someone's heart must be racing right now." A large grin adorn her face and the elder rolled her eyes. "Whatever, just go eat." she frowned, finishing up her plate of noodles but her mind was distracted by her crush.

Her crush, her crush, her crush.

Her crush whom lasted longer than two years now. She lowered her eyes, hiding back an embarrassed goofy smile. Just why did she felt so giddy around him?

Toph who saw her nearly gagged. Katara always seemed to have hearts in her eyes about this guy. She squinted, knowing she couldn't give him a look over but assessed him by how he talked and walked. So far, pretty good but he sounded a bit young for Katara.

The early bell for lunch rang, signifying that they had five minutes to finish up eating and throw everything away before the actual bell rang and they would move onto their next class.

Her long hair was tied up in a high ponytail, mimicking some cheerleaders as she stood up to throw away her food. Just as she did, someone's foot shot up and she who wasn't aware tripped, the milk bottle spraying all over her shirt and over her pants. She glanced down at her shirt, wincing.

Katara hung her head. This always happened, every day. She somehow wasn't used to it.

Pushing up her constructing glasses, she stood up solemnly as if nothing had ever bothered her and moved towards the trashcan, dumping all of the much needed trash in there. She pouted slightly. *If only I could toss Azula and her lackeys in here.*

How she ached for the day to be over.

* * *

It was time for physical education but boy did she hate it.

She supposed she wasn't all that bad at a few sports, namely dance, swim and tennis, but the rest she failed at.

Horribly too, I might add.

Katara looked around nervously, her dark blue shorts that cut at the knee and her long sleeved blue and white striped sweater to cover her lanky arms. Katara was always self conscious about her body, and she was especially to gymnast Ty Lee. She was a bit of a girly girl, much less cold and quite civil at times compared to their head cheerleader and she was the one Katara liked the most.

Ty Lee stood on end of the gym, her eyes for once not playful nor cheery but focused and zeroed in to a single spot. Her chest rose and fell and she started moving. Putting one foot over the other, she raced down, taking a jump and spun in the air, landing on the ground lightly and swiftly but she was far from done. Once she had landed, she began a series of flips and jumps, ending her show with a center split, an impossible move unless your legs were flexible like rubber.

Applause rose from the other students as she stood up, beaming at the widespread attention and adoration. Ty Lee laughed, waving back to the boys and girls flocking around her and Katara inched away, the attention seeming too much for her to handle.

"Alright cupcakes, show's over, get back on your number!" the students gawked at each other, moving frantically to their correct numbers as Coach Iroh moved to get their attendance. He was a quirky man who was always wise and calm, and him as their coach moved onto him as their master. Despite his age, he moved swiftly and deftly, still strong and powerful. Katara questioned why he became a coach but not tea shop owner.

Regardless, as soon as he approached Katara's number, a faint smile danced on his lips. "Good morning, Katara."

"Morning Coach," she greeted back enthusiastically, pushing up her sliding spectacles. Several students rolled their eyes, murmuring something about teacher's pet and stepped away from the girl.

"Okay," Iroh put away the clipboard used to check for attendance and grinned at the others. "Guess what today is?"

Katara looked away, crossing her fingers and closed her eyes. She hoped it wouldn't be what she thought it'd be.

"Volleyball!" students chorused loudly, racing forward to claim their teams like armies charging forward in battle and Katara was horrified. It resembled a scene where it was prom season and it was dress hunting, girls battling it out for short mini fabrics like gladiators.

Shaking her head, she hid behind a large pillar in the gym and stared at the students. Whenever she saw that she had to participate in sports, she groaned, want nothing more than to hide behind bars and whimper. She was awful at sports and far from athletic as well.

Her slim figure came from not eating much, but not from exercising and she was nothing close to being athletic or strong. Iroh turned to her, blinking at seeing the girl hide and moved toward her. "Hey Katara, it's only a game, don't take it too seriously." He offered it reassuringly.

Hesitantly, she moved from her hiding spot and suddenly, she found herself in the position to serve. Katara gulped.

"Shit."

* * *

**Soooooooo...how was it? :D**

**I know I know, I just thought of this last night but what do you think guys? **

**Other people will be making their appearances...tomorrow. ;)**

**Review!**


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